Calling Santa gets a family-sized upgrade to bring families together this Christmas
With new research pointing to a rise in sibling squabbles over Christmas, Telstra has refreshed its Santa calling experience so kids everywhere can share the magic together.
To help bring families together, and keep the peace this Christmas, Telstra’s Free Calls to Santa experience has evolved so more than one child can enjoy chatting to Santa on the same call this year.
We’ve marked the occasion by building Australia’s first family-sized payphone, allowing siblings, cousins, family and friends to call Santa all at once, with overhead speakers so everyone can hear his replies.
We know waiting your turn can be a big ask when you’ve got a Christmas wish list ready to go. New research from Telstra has found that while Christmas might be the season of togetherness, it doesn’t mean the squabbles stop. More than 70%1 of parents say their children argue just as much or even more over the Christmas period, with sharing and taking turns still very much part of the festive family dynamic.
The excitement around Santa can bring its own challenges too. More than four in ten (43%) parents2 find keeping kids patient while waiting to meet or call Santa challenging, while almost one in three (29%)3 struggle to make sure every child gets a fair turn.
Parents have their tricks for keeping the peace too, with more than a third (37%)4 resorting to the Christmas classic: reminding their kids that Santa is watching .
Calls to Santa will help support Kids Helpline
From 10-17 November every call made to Santa from any payphone across the country will help support Kids Helpline. $1 per call* will be donated to the charity, helping young Australians get the support they need this Christmas.
Kids Helpline provides free, 24/7 support for young people aged 5-25. Last Christmas Day alone, Kids Helpline received a call for help every four minutes and in the past year, more than 8,000 calls were made to it from Telstra payphones.
Want to visit the family-sized payphone?
Families can find Australia's largest payphone at Queen Victoria Market in Melbourne from now until Christmas Eve.
Groups can speak to Santa through one handset and hear his replies through overhead speakers, so no one misses out on the call.
Can't make it to our family-sized payphone? No worries. All our regular Telstra payphones across the country are connected to the North Pole, so from 10 November until Christmas Eve, Aussies everywhere can call Santa for free from one of our 14,000+ payphones.
How to call Santa free from any payphone across the country
Step 1: Use our Payphone Finder on Telstra.com, opens in a new window, opens in a new window or Google Maps to locate your nearest one. We also have over 300 sites across the country with two or more payphones located next to each other where all the family can head to make a call together. Santa’s elves have also added some extra Christmas cheer to select festive payphones - check our Festive Payphone Map, opens in a new window, opens in a new window below to find one near you.
Step 2: Dial #HOHOHO (#464646) for free from any of Telstra’s 14,000+ public phones nationwide.
Step 3: Deliver your wish list to Santa and share the experience with a sibling or friend.
Bonus option: For little callers wanting a special chat with Santa on one of our special kid-sized payphones, these will be available exclusively at our Melbourne Flagship Store as well as our Sydney and Brisbane Discovery Store.
For the super fans: From 1 December, all Telstra retail stores across the country will feature a special Santa phone making it even easier for customers to get their wish list in.
We started Free Calls to Santa in 2021 as a simple way to bring some Christmas cheer to Aussie kids. Since then, callers have made nearly 2.5 million* calls to Santa, averaging almost 6 million minutes of calls in total.
*Based on Telstra Free Calls to Santa call data from 2021 – 2026
How Telstra payphones serve communities year-round
Our payphones are free for standard national and mobile calls year-round, helping people connect when they need it most. Since making all payphones free in August 2021, usage has more than tripled – now averaging over 25 million calls a year, including more than one million calls to emergency services over the past five years. Today, over 4,000 payphones offer free Wi-Fi, and 1,000 have been upgraded with extended battery backup and improved disaster-resilience features to help keep communities connected when it matters most.
Source: Research conducted by Pureprofile on behalf of Telstra in October 2026 among 1,012 Australian parents/legal guardians of children aged 5–17.
1 70.5% of parents said their children have disagreements with siblings, cousins or friends either about as often (54.7%) or more often (15.8%) during the Christmas period compared with other times of the year.
2 43% of parents said they find keeping kids patient while waiting to meet or call Santa challenging.
3 29% of parents said they find making sure every child gets a fair turn when meeting or calling Santa challenging.
4 37% of parents said they remind their children that Santa is watching to help manage disagreements or encourage good behaviour over the Christmas period.
*Donations to Kids Helpline between 10-17 November will be made up to a predetermined amount.